Our Mission

Create Global Healing is a nonprofit organization striving to light the spirit of hope, healing, dignity and peace for traumatized young adults in war-torn countries by providing trauma healing, heart-centered leadership and economic sustainability support, as well as providing inspirational connections between these young people, US students and humanitarians we serve. We believe that global healing will take place through compassionate, heart-centered experiences that foster the understanding that we are all connected as global citizens desiring the same things – to love and be loved, to live a meaningful life and to have a bright, peaceful future.

Chantal’s Miracle

Philosophy

We believe that everyone is entitled to live a life with dignity, peace and hope and that the promise for peace in our world lies in nurturing our children in becoming global citizens and heart-centered leaders. By providing support for traumatized young people around the world and developing opportunities for US students and humanitarians to connect with young people, Create Global Healing seeks to shine a beacon of light on one of the greatest human gifts that can unite us all – the power and resilience of the human heart and spirit.

The future of our world lies in the hands of our children - our next generation of leaders.

Perhaps you have felt the same sense of overwhelm (I call it a crisis of imagination) as I did when I used to contemplate how we would achieve peace in our hearts and peace in our world. All that changed for me after my grief and trauma counseling work with genocide survivors in Rwanda, Africa in the fall of 2007.

Working with amazingly resilient widows and orphan head of households changed my life and opened me to the possibilities for world healing beyond what I could envision before this trip. There are truly so many deserving individuals in Rwanda and in our world however the survivors that seem to be the most under-served are Orphan Head of Households (OHH) - children raising children.

I had the privilege of doing stress and trauma healing work with over 100 Orphan Head of Households, all genocide survivors between the ages of 17 and 30, all destitute and all caring for 3 to 6 younger orphans. Experiencing their open-heartedness and courage in the face of surviving war, death, AIDs, torture, mutilation, rape and poverty profoundly stirred my soul.

After an intense week of working together, these Orphan Head of Households created a play for us about their lives and the following prayer:

Even though we face so many challenges and it is hard for us to forgive because we live with the consequences (of the genocide) every day we want you to know that we give thanks to God for sending you, for your coming all this way to teach us important lessons and for caring about us. Please go back to America and tell people about us. Be safe in your journey home. May God bless you, your families and all the work you do.

Please do not forget us and please come back.

My soul was so deeply stirred by their resilience, open-heartedness and promise that I returned home determined to raise awareness and support them in whatever way I can to ensure a more hopeful future for them and for all of us.

If conditions for these young people, and for the growing number of orphans around the globe, do not change, our future leaders and terrorists will continue to be motivated by fear, despair, greed and hate.

Project LIGHT: Rwanda

Each time I returned from Rwanda my heart broke open to the possibilities for world healing. Project LIGHT: Rwanda was conceived – a vision for establishing the world’s first international youth healing, heart-centered leadership and economic sustainability program. In 2011, with the help of grassroots donors and Nick Ortner, founder of The Tapping Solution, Project LIGHT: Rwanda became a reality. 12 Project LIGHT Ambassadors completed a 4-week residential training program and with continued support from middle school children to adults are being sponsored for university and entrepreneurial activities. And they are THRIVING!

If survivors of one of the most horrific tragedies in the world can forgive, heal and reconcile then there is hope for all of us to do the same.

On December 14, 2012 one of the worst school shootings took place at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, CT. Nick Ortner just happened to be a Newtown resident. Within days, Dr. Leyden was on the ground heading up Mr. Ortner’s Foundation and establishing a community-based trauma healing model serving those affected by the tragedy. Just two months later, Project LIGHT: Rwanda Ambassadors were reaching out to a 12-year-old boy who had lost his brother in the shooting. Our documentary tells the story of what is possible when our traumatized young people in the world are able to connect and heal.

I am more convinced than ever that we can create global healing in our lifetime.

With gratitude, love, joy and wonder

Lori Leyden, Founder

Values

“Our desire is to make a significant contribution to bringing about a collective “heart” shift that results in global peace and healing in our world. Our vision is for adults and children worldwide to connect with each other in a spirit of “Oneness,” and an unbroken circuit of giving and receiving so that we can all participate in co-creating a better future for ourselves and our world.” Lori Leyden, Founder

Our foundation values are to:

Focus on the resilience of the human spirit

Connect with people with shared vision

Foster global healing through heart-centered leadership programs

Inspire the spirit of abundance by offering giving and receiving experiences.

Create collaborations with individuals and organizations that share our mission and values.

Lori Leyden - Founder

Lori Leyden, PhD, MBA is a trauma healing professional known internationally for using EFT/Tapping in her work with hundreds of orphan genocide survivors in Rwanda.

Dr. Leyden founded the non-profit Create Global Healing (CGH) and established Project LIGHT: Rwanda – the world’s first international youth healing, heart-centered leadership and entrepreneurship program.

Project LIGHT is a new form of humanitarian aid nurturing our next generation of young people to heal, work and lead us into a peaceful future.

In alignment with her mission to create global healing, Dr. Leyden also heads up The Tapping Solution Foundation’s humanitarian work including supporting those affected by the Sandy Hook Elementary School tragedy.

She is the Executive Producer of the documentary When I Was Young I Said I Would Be Happy which chronicles the transformation of 12 Project LIGHT Ambassadors and how they paid their healing forward to hundreds, in Rwanda and Newtown, CT.